The DVD industry is a global industry. Throughout the Americas, Europe and Asia, there are now numerous countries in which DVD publishing is a thriving business. To assist the proliferation of the DVDs, it is advantageous to provide discs in local languages relevant to particular territories.
In the days of VHS video, the production and distribution of localised versions of a feature film and other video content was costly, since many different language versions of each title would be required. In recognition of this problem, DVD-Video was designed at the outset to enable more cost-effective production and distribution of titles for multiple territories. The DVD-Video specification provides the following in an attempt to address the above issue:                1. Up to eight multichannel audio tracks can be included on a DVD-Video disc, enabling dubbed audio in up to eight different languages;        2. Up to 32 sub-picture streams can be incorporated, allowing subtitles to be delivered on a single disc in up to 32 different languages;        3. Region coding enables publishers and distributors to control the deployment of products by territory.        
These features mean that publishers are able to distribute titles that can be enjoyed in many local languages without having to produce a completely new product for each country. It is not unusual for blockbuster feature films to be available in between 20 and 30 different languages. Even low-budget and back catalogue titles are routinely produced in around 10 languages.
Localizing a Title for Multiple Territories Typically Entails the Following Activities:
                1. Dubbing of the soundtrack using voice talent and synchronising the dubbed soundtrack with the original audio;        2. Translating the spoken language and providing subtitles using the DVD-Video sub-picture capability;        3. Producing a version of each menu in the target language;        4. Authoring the menu system required for each language.        
The cost of items 1 and 2 is predominantly determined by the cost of labour to translate and, in the case of the soundtrack, to record the voiceover the local language. These are both inherently manual processes offering limited opportunity to streamline through automated processes. Items 3 and 4, representing a significant production cost, are currently undertaken using predominantly manual processes. Therefore, their cost is also closely related to labour costs.
Although the precise process employed for localisation of titles varies from studio to studio, FIG. 1 shows a typical localisation process 100 in North America. The studio forwards a specification of its design requirements 102 to a design bureau. The design bureau analyses the menu design requirements to design the menu system and structure at process 104. The work product 106 produced by the menu system and design process 104 is a design document. The design document 106 is used to create, in menu design process 108, composited menu background data and menu text 110.
The composited menu data 110 is sent to an authoring facility. The authoring facility includes the composited menu data 110 into a current project and the resulting project is processed to convert the elements of that project into the DVD-Video format, which complies with one of the DVD specifications relevant to the DVD industry. The processing undertaking by the authoring facility is carried out at process 112. The result of process 112 is a work product in the form of a DVD-Video disc image 114 for North America.
The DVD-disc image for North America is forwarded by the authoring facility to the design bureau, which, in turn, forwards the DVD-video disc image or media containing such an image to the studio for approval. Once the studio has approved the disc or, in particular, the menu system and structure, the studio instructs the design bureau to create menu systems and structures for a number of target languages.
The studio forwards to a translation company an indication of the menu text needing translating as well as an indication of the target languages into which the menu text should be translated. At process 116 the translation company translates the text of the menu into the target languages. The work product 118 of the translation process 116 is a set of menu text items in prescribed languages.
The set of menu text items is forwarded from the translation company to the design bureau. The design bureau, at process 120, creates a menu system and structure for each of the target languages using the sets of menu texts in the respective languages of the target languages. The work product of the process 120 is a number of sets 122 of composited menu data comprising respective background stills or video loops together with respective menu text, in the prescribed target languages, as well as associated sub-picture and menu button information.
The sets of composited menu data are forwarded to the authoring facility. The authoring facility, at process 124, uses the sets of composited menu data to create a DVD-Video image or disc 126 for each a number of target territories according to the target languages.
The DVD-Video disc images for each of the target territories are forwarded by the authoring facility to the studio for approval.
In the above overall process 100, it can be appreciated that creating multiple language versions of the menus involves repeatedly performing the steps of composting of menu text onto the background and authoring the DVD-Video disc images using one or more language sets of the menus. Both of these steps are very labour-intensive and costly. Furthermore, the above overall process 100 can typically take several weeks to complete. It will be appreciated that such a duration for completion and the associated labour costs are undesirable.
Referring to FIG. 2 there is shown various schematic representations 200 of the work products described above in FIG. 1.
The representations 200 of the work products produced in FIG. 1 comprise menu background data 202 in the form of either a still image or video 204 that, ultimately, will be arranged to loop together with a number of graphical elements 206. It will be appreciated, for the sake of simplicity, that the still image or video 204 is not shown in great detail.
A set of menu text items 208 is schematically illustrated. The sets of menu text items 208 comprise a plurality of words 210 intended to be placed adjacent to the graphical elements 206. It can be appreciated that the words include “Film”, “Origins”, “Storyboard Introduction”, “Production Design”, “Storyboard to Film Comparison”, “More” and “Main Menu”.
A set of highlight data 212 comprising a number of graphical highlight elements 214 is also created. The graphical highlight elements 214 are used to selectively highlight corresponding words of the plurality of words 210. It can be appreciated that the size, that is, the length in the embodiment illustrated, of the graphical highlight elements has been arranged to match the length of the corresponding words.
It can be appreciated that a complete set 216 of the menu background data, set of menu text items and menu of graphical highlight elements is illustrated.
The menu background data and the set of menu text items are used to produce the video stream 218 comprising composited menu background data and menu text. The graphical highlight elements 214, in conjunction with selectable buttons 222, are used to create a sub-picture stream 224 suitable for the selectively revealing the graphical highlight elements 214 in response to corresponding events.
It can be appreciated that the compositing process has been undertaken a number of times to produce data sets 226, 228, 230 and 232. These data sets can be used to reduce corresponding video streams in prescribed target languages. It can be appreciated that FIG. 2 illustrates English, Norwegian, Danish and Swedish potential video streams.
It will be appreciated from the above that the translation of the English-language set of menu text items into Norwegian, Danish and Swedish will impact on the size, that is, length, of the text forming the sets of menu text corresponding to the Norwegian, Danish and Swedish languages. This, in turn, has an impact on the size, that is, length in the illustrated embodiments, of any corresponding graphical highlight elements, which, also, in turn, has an impact on the dimensions of the menu buttons 222 that are used to selectively reveal the corresponding graphical highlight elements 214. Therefore, it can be appreciated that creating localised menus, that is, menus in the various target languages, is significantly more complex than merely translating a set of menu text items for a menu in one language into corresponding sets of menu texts in prescribed languages.
In the conventional approach to DVD title development and localisation, all of the video streams, sub-picture streams and highlight regions are created and configured manually. For each territory disc (where typically each disc will contain several language versions of the menus), the version must be authored multiple times since the DVD-video structure created during the authoring process cannot easily be reused. Since each language edition may incorporate many menus, localising menu systems involves considerable time and cost.
It is an object of embodiments of the present invention to at least mitigate some of the problems of the prior art.